Chapter 8 - THE DRESS WITH SOMEONE ELSE'S NAME
In the garage recording, Alex reached his car at 10:14 a.m. He stood beside it for almost a minute, looking at his phone. Then he got in and drove away.
Victoria's number appeared on his call log later, when records were produced. That would come months after. For now, I only had the picture of a man with time to think, choosing not to come back.
At the station, Detective Mills watched the office footage without speaking. He asked me to explain the fall in my own words.
"I threw the paperwork," I said. "I was furious. I shouldn't have thrown it."
"And then?"
"He shoved my arm. I went backward."
"Did he call an ambulance?"
"No."
The detective replayed the part where Alex opened my gift. "You believe this is your ultrasound?"
"I know it is. The baby's in the picture. My name and appointment date are at the top."
"All right," he said. "We'll ask for the original files and talk to the people who saw what happened afterward."
Outside the station, I stood in the wind and tried to feel relieved. I mostly felt sick.
Laura took me to Mrs. Vega's bridal studio on Michigan Avenue. The seamstress had gray hair pinned with two orange pencils and a ruler tucked behind her neck. She was arranging fabric when she saw me.
"Erin," she said. "I heard. I'm sorry."
"Did you know?" I asked.
Her face answered before she did.
She brought out a battered alterations ledger and turned to the week of my wedding. On the first line were Victoria's measurements. On the next, two days later, were mine.
"They told me there'd been a change in plans," she said. "I thought you understood."
"Nobody told me it was her dress."
Mrs. Vega sat down heavily. "The bride before you left her shoes in the fitting room. Your mother-in-law asked me to throw them away. I didn't. They're still in a box somewhere. I thought somebody might need them. Silly, I know."
"Not silly," Laura said.
I traced my finger over the ledger. At the bottom was a charge for a replacement nameplate sewn inside the gown.
"I wore the same dress," I whispered.
"Yes."
"Did Alex know?"
Mrs. Vega gave me the same sad look a doctor gives someone who has asked a question with an obvious answer.
"He brought the gown to me himself."
I closed the ledger. I could smell the steam from the iron in the back room, the same smell I'd breathed the morning I married him.
"He held the back of my dress at the altar," I told Laura. "I thought he was nervous because he loved me."
Laura didn't correct me. There was nothing useful to correct.
When we returned to her office, a forensic accountant named Nia Brooks was waiting beside a stack of bank statements.
"I have a problem," Nia said.
"Which one?" I asked.
She slid a page across the table. It showed a loan secured by the small storefront my mother had left me. I had never applied for a loan on it.
Under BORROWER AUTHORIZATION was a signature that looked almost exactly like mine.
May you like
Almost.
The capital E was wrong.
